Friday, October 30, 2009

Road trip to Cooperstown, NY to visit friends. We visited the studios of artist Susan Goetz and Robert Schneider. Susan was working on a portrait of a child that was on her easel. The studios are combined work space and gallery space for both artists who are married. Her father was Richard Vernon Goetz, an accomplished artist and teacher. Her portrait commissions have included Barry Goldwater and retired Supreme Court Justice, Sandra Day O'Connor. It was a wonderful visit filled with stories of her father, and her own experiences with painting. Inspired.Here is a link to an interesting article about the two of them.

Monday, October 26, 2009

Winston Churchill's famous quote, "Never, never, never, never give up" served me well today.After asking for Murray's direction on the first version I decided to go in further search of the elusive "stitchy line" so characteristic of David Stone Martin and Ben Shahn. I have tried drawing with brushes and several different pen nibs. Read that DSM was hard on his nibs and probably went through a few just in one drawing. So I decided to push the nib a bit harder and started coming up with what I think Murray was talking about--the "stitchy line". I even tried Andy Warhol's blotted line (printing) technique (the blotchy line drawing above) I also made some color changes and tried to push that further also...

Sunday, October 25, 2009

I've been working on a magazine cover assignment for Hartford. Picked the decade of the 50's, TIME magazine and am using a Ben Shahn/David Stone Martin (DSM) approach. I was going to go for black and white but Churchill was such a colorful character. I probably could have pushed the color even more, but I was concentrating on the line, which is tricky. DSM was an assistant to Ben Shahn and it shows in his work, especially the jazz album cover designs from the fifties. May do some other versions...hmmm.

Friday, October 23, 2009

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Reorganizing and cleaning the studio and found this illustration from Bunny Carter's class in the summer program at Hartford. This is Woody Guthrie as a child and his mother who used to sing to him. According to Guthrie she was a big influence on him. It's traditonal pen and ink which I brought into PS for effects. It ended up having a kind of wood cut quality which I liked because of the subject. Getting ready for Pasadena trip in November. I've been experimenting with pen and ink for a magazine cover assignment. I've chosen the decade of the 50's and using a Ben Shahn/David Stone Martin-esque style...more to come.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Birds at the feeder are having a feeding frenzy...must be the colder weather. Woodpeckers, nuthatches, cardinals, and chickadees today. They are for the most part very polite and take turns. A lot of commotion from hundreds of migrating birds today while they rested in the trees outside. The cold is here.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Red everywhere. Newest 3x3 came in the mail:) with great cover by Nick Dewar. My favorite inside is Sara Fanelli (The truth is never pure and rarely simple-). I've been a fan of Sara's for a long time...since her 1995 My Map Book. Thank you Charles Hively for a great thirteenth issue!

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

This was made in PS from a photo I took of a friend's son at a lake. Thinking of doing a drawing based on this photo...Happened upon Daniel Sprick website...pretty amazing contemporary realism.Making progress on Gary Kelly ( Neo Realist ...as long as we are talking labels:) paper.

from Illustration: A Visual History by Steven Heller and Seymour Chwast

“ In the early 1960’s, New Journalism was a form of editorialized reportage pioneered by Tom Wolfe (who coined the term), Truman Capote, Norman Mailer, Jimmy Breslin, Hunter S. Thompson, Joan Didion, Peter Hamill, and others for magazines like Esquire, Evergreen, Ramparts, Rolling Stone, and New York, among others. Usually written in the first person with literary flourishes, which was uncommon in most newspapers at the time, the approach challenged traditional, objective, third-person journalism by injecting more spice, and more personal insight, to the reportage stew. Parallel to this innovation in the 1960’s as an illustrative approach with many facets, partly to complement New Journalism, and partly to shake off the rigid notion that illustrative Realism must be a totally faithful representation of life. Like the New Journalists, Neo Realists attempted to look behind the facade of reality to amplify the nuance of say, a particular gesture or expression to impart more, not less, truth. Neo Realism brought more dimension to illustrative practice than the routine, cardboard reality that was de rigueur during the 1940’s and 1950’s in editorial and advertising illustration.” (Heller and Chwast, p. 137)

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

The sun is back. It is always such a huge relief. Although a sunless steel blue sky against all the orange and red of the trees is quite remarkable too. I've been having internet connection issues, but all is fixed now. Right now am immersed in research about illustrator Gary Kelly, (pictured above with Murray Tinkelman on left) who was a visiting lecturer at our MFA program this past summer. Here is one of his latest projects. Very inspiring....itching to pull out the Nupastels ....more to come.

Friday, October 2, 2009

Experimenting in PhotoShop with magic. I was most fortunate to have a mini-session with friend, extraordinary artist, designer, illustrator, Q Cassetti . Q shared some tips and tricks with me! Thank you Q! This is serious play.....more to come.

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Exciting news! This whimsical terracotta sculpture is by Svetlana Gorbachova of Borovichi, Russia. She was a visiting (amazing) artist in residence here a few years ago. I recently heard from naturalist/author Rick Marsi that she may be coming back for another residency. Also exciting is Rick's release of his audio CD of spoken word essays on nature available here.